Fotini Christia

Fotini Christia is the Ford International Professor of the Social Sciences in the Department of Political Science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and serves as Director of the Institute for Data, Systems, and Society (IDSS). Previously, she directed the Sociotechnical Systems Research Center (SSRC), served as Associate Director of IDSS, and chaired the doctoral program in Social and Engineering Systems (SES) at MIT's Schwarzman College of Computing. She is also affiliated with the Department of Mechanical Engineering and the Center for Ocean Engineering at MIT.

Her educational background includes a joint BA in Economics–Operations Research and an MA in International Affairs from Columbia University (graduated magna cum laude in 2001), followed by a PhD in Public Policy from Harvard University in 2008.

Professor Christia's research bridges social sciences, data science, and computation, with a focus on addressing systemic racism across housing, healthcare, policing, and social media. She is currently working to integrate AI tools in public policy. Her earlier work focused on conflict and cooperation in the Muslim world, with extensive fieldwork conducted in Afghanistan, Bosnia, Iraq, Iran, the Palestinian Territories, Syria, and Yemen.

Her publications span multiple disciplines including political science, computer science, public health, and network science, reflecting her interdisciplinary approach to complex sociotechnical problems. Recent work shows increasing integration of computational methods with traditional social science research to address issues of bias, inequality, and governance.

• Luebbert Award for Best Book in Comparative Politics
• Lepgold Prize for Best Book in International Relations
• Distinguished Book Award from the International Studies Association
• Andrew Carnegie Fellow
• Harvard Academy Fellow

Professor Christia has secured research funding from multiple sources including MURI and DARPA grants, as well as support from Google, the International Growth Center, the Russell Sage Foundation, USAID, CIDA, the UN, and the World Bank. She has advised numerous graduate students through MIT's Social and Engineering Systems PhD program and Political Science department.

She leads initiatives through the Sociotechnical Systems Research Center and contributes to MIT's efforts in addressing systemic racism through data science approaches, particularly through the Initiative on Combatting Systemic Racism within IDSS.